FINNished

After sitting about for several months and lately inspired by my friend Scott who is working on Finns, I completed six Model 75As today. I just needed to do some touchup, add decals, put a little decal set on same, and then hit them with a coat of gloss and a coat of matt varnish. While not perfect (my yellow is so thin that even after five coats there is some bleed and a few other little paint gaffs) they are pretty decent gaming pieces.

Ready to face those sneaky Soviets - looking much darker and shinier in the pic

I went with the early war scheme - as these had been planes the Germans had taken from the French and Norwegians they had been painted in RLM71 (Dunkelgrün) over RLM65 (Hellblau) by the Germans and left that way by the Finns (the more known black and olive green scheme came into use later in the war). I used Vallejo Model Air paints for nearly all the work (the aforementioned RLM71 and RLM65 along with natural metal, chrome yellow, and NATO black), the exception being Foundry Bavarian blue on the canopy. National insignia are decals from Beacon (from I-94) which are nicely done individual decals (although I split one somehow) and finished with numbers from Flight Deck Decals. Oh, the miniatures themselves are crackin' good 3D prints, also from Flight Deck.

The color is better in this snap - and now I see more touchup work needing to be done!

New Toys

Admittedly I have been on a bit of a painted aircraft buying spree of late. If Misc Minis would stop offering painted planes, then I would stop buying them! The most recent additions were a trio of planes I needed for Burma, and a plane I did not need at all! 

In proper CY6! shotai formation

Let's start with the planes for Burma. Here we have a shotai of beautifully painted Nakajima Ki-44 Shōki, known as Tojo to the Allies. These crisp 3D printed fighters (manufacturer unknown) are in a pair of scenarios ("Putting the Squeeze on Rangoon" and "Birthday Surprise") from Battles Above 3 (where one can find their ratings as well*), and needing only three for both scenarios it was a perfect time to snag them. Hmmm, now I have a surplus as I already have a shotai of unpainted Tojos...but that's the way that it is (thanks, Uriah Heep - the band, not Dickens).

And the plane I did not need at all...drum roll, please...the Blohm & Voss BV 138 Seedrache (Sea Dragon). Yeah, I had ZERO need for this one, but it called out to me, singing its siren, or in this case, dragon song, "buy me, buy me," and so I did. I believe it might be an MSD Games model, and one of their betters ones if so. I created a few scenario outlines that feature this plane, and the scenarios are very small encounters, typically being one player for each side. This would make some interesting (code for different) gaming I think, especially the flying boat vs. flying boat encounter I have some details on. There are no aircraft stats that I know of so I will be creating my own (UPDATE: I went ahead and did create stats: F2 + 0 Lx, 3/26, R3, F: 1xLVC, R: 1xLVC (but only may fire at targets at same or higher TAL), RT: 1xHMG, SR: 1xLMG). It sucks, but it is a flying boat, so there's that.

The Beast Rabban...I mean the BV 138

Hmmm, now I need to buy opponents for the BV!

*A fairly meh but fast C5 + 2 29/46 R0 FF: 2xHMG, 2xLMG for the Ia model, adding in Hx for the IIb and going to FF: 4xHMG. Actually, not bad, but that robustness, aye yi yi!

The Caudron-Renault CR.714 Ratings

How bad is it truly? While within my previous post on this less than desirable fighter I provided some Check Your 6! stats for the Cyclone, I did a deeper dive on its performance and used the Bf 109, Bf 110, and M.S.406 stats for baseline comparisons. The results are not great. And I still do not agree with the speed that good old AI came up with, as my research indicated a top speed of less than 300 miles per hour, but let's give the Caudron something to hold onto! Well, it does have a decent dive rating.

As the Caudron was not engaged at high altitude in the scenarios I am generating, I did not go through the exercise of determining its stats above 20,000 feet. I cannot imagine they would be very good.

In the CY6! format: